Category Archives: stability ball exercises

Back strengthening exercises – a few words on intensity

Back strengthening exercises should aim to improve muscle tone if they aim to help people with back problems and back pain.

A lot of people feel, they only get a good workout, when “it hurts”. Short spurts of maximum intensity are perceived as more effective than medium intensity exercises over a longer period of time. Whether or not this is really the case is currently a source of hot debate in the science and research world. Some research suggests, the time a muscle is engaged has a better training effect than the actual strain intensity. My words of wisdom here are based on my experience working with people in my program and focusing on core and back strengthening exercises. There is no problem pushing the intensity level provided proper technique is maintained. So, while you can up the intensity level by using weights doing core and back strengthening exercises, at no point should the core stability or joint position be compromised. And you should spend time in the position itself.

You need a bit of both – medium to high intensity exercises which are performed slowly and in a controlled manner. The aim of any exercise program should be to improve your health and fitness. I encourage all my course participants to evaluate any back strengthening exercise program or other kind of activity themselves. Are the exercises controlled and are the movements done in a manner without compromising the joints or muscle capabilities? See our guidelines for more information.

Although weights can be a useful tool when exercising, they are not necessary for an exercise to be effective. By altering the body position and increasing the leverage, any of the back strengthening exercises we do, can be made sufficiently difficult, so that you get a training effect. However, when properly used, weights can make a back strengthening exercises program that little bit more varied and interesting with higher levels of intensity attained that little bit quicker.

The ball is a great tool when doing a back strengthening exercises program. There is an entire set of stability ball exercises which will strengthen your core and back. We also use a number of small weights and do a lot of resistance training using a Thera-Band.

back strengthening exercises

 

Are you looking for Back Strengthening Exercises?

On this site you will find a comprehensive back strengthening exercises program. Next to back strengthening exercises we include stretches and mobility exercises for the back in particular stretches for lower back pain and neck tension. We have been teaching this program for over fifteen years. Our back strengthening exercises have helped our program participants to reduce and eliminate their back problems.

We also have found in order to get rid of back pain and other back problems people need to know what causes them. When you know how your back problems are caused you can learn to prevent them. You will also know what kind of back strengthening exercises are good (see our movement and exercise guidelines). You quickly realise that some so called back exercises are not so good. Unfortunately there are a lot of back damaging activities and exercise programs out there claiming to be good for the back. Once you know how to avoid back damaging activities you can re-engage because you will know how to do these activities in a way that they don’t cause you problems.

Back strengthening exercises are a really good idea and a lifestyle choice if you have an otherwise sedentary lifestyle or are engaged in activities that caused your back problems. Sometimes it takes as little as 15 minutes of our back strengthening exercises every couple of days to balance out the acitivities of your life that might have caused you problems before.

All our participants have successfully got rid of their back problems. they are using our back strengthening exercise program. With it they have regained good core stability.

Core stability describes the correct functioning of those muscles, mainly the hips, stomach and back musculature, responsible for uprightness and stability of the upper body.

If muscles in your stomach are weak and/or your back muscles are tense and tight weakness in these areas can result in misalignment of the spine. This can cause discomfort and pain, often in the upper and lower back. It can also lead to increased wear and tear causing irreversible damage to the in the spine and nervous system.

Therefore a central part of the program we do is to provide exercises to re-establish and maintain a good muscle balance.

However, we strongly believe it is important to learn about good movement practices. That way we can ensure that not only is our exercise program is done correctly — but any other activity we engage in, too!

•information about the source of back problems and the structure and functionality of the spine

•simple guidelines on how to move in a back friendly way on a day-to-day basis and during exercising

•a comprehensive set of back strengthening exercises to re-establish a healthy musculature which supports the spine

Our back strengthening exercise program is for men and women of all ages. We use an exercise ball for many of the back strengthening exercises. Just sitting on a ball, much like you would sit on a chair is a back strengthening exercise.

active sitting - stomach exercises and back strengthening exercises for the ball

active sitting – stomach exercises and back strengthening exercises for the ball